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ADDRESSES 

ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS 

By 

JAMES KEITH 


FAUQUIER 


Prioately Printed 


19 17 

RICHMOND, VA. 




APPEALS PRESS, Inc. 
Richmond, Va. 



JU/cA. 


I dedicate this little book 
to 

THE BLACK HORSE TROOP 
(Co. H. Fourth Virginia Cavalry C. S. A.) 

1861-1865 

In tender memory of the Dead, 

With affectionate greetings to the Living. 

My proudest thought is that 
I was one of them. 



These Addresses, delivered at various times to vary¬ 
ing audiences, are printed, with some misgivings, as a 
souvenir for my friends and as a token of my friend¬ 
ship. 

My sincerest wish is that they may he accepted in 
the same kindly spirit in which they are given, 

J. K. 


Richmcmd, Virginia, 1917. 



AT MOUNT VERNON 

Welcome to American Bar Association Visiting 
Mount Vernon ; Read by Hon. A. J. Montague, 
Judge Keith Being too Unwell to be Present. 

[October 21, 

I am charged with the pleasing duty of welcoming 
you to Virginia, to her Holy of Holies, to Mount Ver¬ 
non, where ‘‘Washington hath left his awful memory a 
light for aftertimes.'' We seem to be in, and to feel, 
his presence. The calm, the repose, the dignity of this 
hallowed spot are in perfect tune and harmony with 
his character. If history be philosophy teaching by 
example, to what fountain of inspiration shall we go 
to learn pure and exalted lessons of all that elevates 
and ennobles man, of all that tends to make him a good 
and virtuous citizen; where, if not to the tomb of him 
who was acclaimed by a nation's voice, “First in war, 
First in peace, and First in the hearts of his country¬ 
men" ? 

To lawyers, above all men, the memory and example 
of Washington should be dear. The ruling principle 
of his character was love of law and order; throughout 
life, from youth to age, in all things small and great, 
it was the dominant force that shaped and controlled 
his life. Who among men has done so much for his 
fellow-man? Wise in counsel, brave but cautious in 
action, with a fortitude unshaken by disaster and a 


8 


Addresses of James Keith 


prudence which the smiles of fortune could not beguile, 
he won the liberties of his country from a people of 
kindred blood, renowned from the dawn of history in 
peace and war, whose “morning drum-beat, following 
the sun, and keeping company with the hours, still 
circles the earth with one unbroken strain of the 
martial airs of England.” 

The result of the War of the Revolution consecrated 
this land to liberty and law. What a mighty benefac¬ 
tion to mankind, in which the apparent loser has gained 
no less than the victor! History taught by a great 
example, and Great Britain wisely conned the lesson; 
and to-day her colonies no longer chafe under her rule, 
but in time of trial India remembers that Great Britain 
has curbed famine within her borders, and Egypt how 
the Nile has been made to enlarge its bounty. 

The wisdom of Washington was never more ap¬ 
parent, was never exerted with greater advantage to 
his country, than in the convention that framed the 
Constitution of the United States. He had just come 
through a war of seven years in which he had won 
never-dying fame. His voice was potential in mould¬ 
ing the institutions under which the country whose 
independence he had achieved was to be governed. A 
character less strong, less perfectly balanced than his, 
might well have felt some perturbation of mind which 
would have prejudiced him against English laws and 
institutions. Not so with Washington. Then, as at 
all times, his unerring judgment tried every proposi¬ 
tion by the light of experience; following the injunc¬ 
tion of the great Apostle he “proved all things and 


At Mount Vernon 


9 


held fast to that which was good^^• and in this time 
of some real and much self-proclaimed progress, it 
would be well for us, too, to recall the mandate of St. 
Paul, and proving all things, hold fast to that which 
is good. 

I am always pleased to remember that when “grim- 
visaged War had smoothed his wrinkled front,and 
the people of these United States were seeking to write 
into their Constitution the results of that mighty 
struggle, our wisest and most learned men could not 
do better than go back seven centuries to the meadow 
of Runnymede, and ordain that henceforth ‘‘no State 
shall deprive any person of life, liberty or property 
without due process of law, nor deny to any person 
within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the law.’" 
What a caveat was there to all reformers! What a 
light was thrown upon the pathway of true progress! 

The frontiers of Rome at the height of her power 
were guarded by "‘ancient renown and disciplined 
valor.^^ The fields of Europe are being drenched and 
its rivers made red with the blood of nations that 
have led the world in every field of physical, intellec¬ 
tual and moral endeavor. Not alone their boundaries, 
but their homes, their firesides and their altars, rest 
upon force to defend them, and in all time the rule of 
the strongest has been respected and obeyed. What 
a contrast a kind Providence enables us to present. 
From the Atlantic to the Pacific our northern border 
marches with that of Canada for more than three 
thousand miles, unwatched by a soldier or a fort. The 
United Kingdom and the United States! Sprung from 


10 


Addresses of James Keith 


a common stock, speaking a common language, living 
under kindred laws and institutions, may they know 
no rivalries except as to which of them shall adhere 
most faithfully to the mandates of truth and justice, 
and strive most earnestly to insure the blessings of 
peace on earth to men of good will! 

Having won for us our liberty, having aided in estab¬ 
lishing wise institutions tried by time and cemented 
by the blood of many generations, Washington, in his 
immortal farewell address, has taught us how these 
blessings are to be preserved; and preserved they will 
be as long as the Potomac shall murmur a requiem to 
his memory if we and those who come after us shall 
follow his example and hearken to his precepts. 

The soul of the Jew is kindled at the thought of 
Jerusalem; the Mohammedan at the hour of prayer 
falls prostrate with his face towards Mecca; the heart 
of the patriot gains force on the plain of Marathon; 
and the Christian finds his faith grow stronger among 
the ruins of Iona; while all men, of whatever clime 
or creed, who love liberty regulated by law, give thanks 
to Almighty God for George Washington. To all such, 
on this day, Virginia extends her kindly greeting and 
her hearty welcome! 


INTRODUCING Mr. JUSTICE GRAY 

John Marshall Centenary. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Bar Association, 
Ladies and Gentlemen: 

The great Alexander exclaimed as he stood at the 
tomb of Achilles, ''0 Fortunate Man, who found a 
Homer as the herald of your heroic deeds And 
truly; for had not the Iliad survived, the tomb which 
held his body would have buried his very name. 

He whose life work we are here to commemorate 
has been scarcely less happy. To have borne a great 
part in one of the most stupendous achievements in 
the world’s history; to have shared in the formation, 
influenced the development, and impressed his mind 
and character upon the institutions and laws of these 
United States, was the supreme good fortune and the 
transcendant merit, of John Marshall. 

No Homer, indeed, has sung his story in immoidal 
verse. The labour of the jurist offers no congenial 
theme to the poet, but the muse of history will find in 
the opinions of the Supreme Court the record of 
Marshall’s work which has earned for him undying 
fame as the ''great Chief Justice,” and which consti¬ 
tutes a monument to his memory more enduring than 
brass. 

In life he was cheered by the affection and aided 
and strengthened by the genius and learning of a 


12 


Addresses of James Keith 


great son of Massachusetts, and their names are indis¬ 
solubly linked together in the memory of men. Who 
can think of Marshall whose next thought is not of 
Story? They labored together in faithful and appre¬ 
ciative friendship and their luminous judgments shine 
upon us with the blended light of a double star. 

A hundred years have passed. Time and Fate have 
established and vindicated the principles for which 
they together wrought, and today another great son 
of the same fruitful mother, an illustrious member of 
that high tribunal in whose presence we seem to 
realize the poet’s vision where 

“Sovereign law, the State’s collected will, 

O’er thrones and globes elate, 

Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill,” 

honors us by his presence. 

0 Fortunate Man!, I can but exclaim, who had Story 
as a friend and co-worker, and whose career after so 
many years is a theme worthy of Mr. Justice Gray of 
Massachusetts! 


GENERAL EPPA HUNTON 

Presentation of His Portrait to Lee Camp. 

Comrades and Friends: 

I congratulate myself upon being permitted to par¬ 
ticipate in this most interesting occasion. It is a 
privilege to be once more with men 

“That ever with a frolic welcome took 
The thunder and the sunshine,” 

who faced every danger with courage, bore every pri¬ 
vation with fortitude, who won victories upon many a 
field which will be famous in story while men cherish 
honor and women love courage; but reserving to the 
last act in the great tragedy the highest, the noblest 
proof of the true temper of their souls, went down in 
defeat, returned to their homes, became good citizens 
as they had been good soldiers, cheerful and steadfast 
amidst ruin and desolation because our great leader 
had said that we carried with us ‘‘the consciousness 
of duty faithfully performed,'^ and what he said was 
to us as though it had been declared by the oracles of 
God. I speak it reverently, oh, my comrades! for his 
lips could not utter aught save the truth. 

You felt that having done great deeds it was your 
duty to preserve the memory of them, and to hand 
down to coming generations memorials of your labours 
and the eiiigies of those who bore a distinguished part 


14 


Addresses of James Keith 


in them. This and the care of those who need as¬ 
sistance are, I believe, the pious objects of this Asso¬ 
ciation. 

I bring to you tonight the portrait of one who is 
worthy to be placed by the side of the noblest and the 
best of those whose pictures adorn your walls. I have 
for forty years been proud to call him my friend— 
not because he has in that time played many parts, 
and played them well, upon almost every stage of 
human action—but because he has ever been brave, 
truthful and just in all his dealings with and relations 
to his fellowmen, and has always borne 

“without abuse. 

The grand old name of gentleman.” 

General Eppa Hunton was born and educated in the 
county of Fauquier, but upon being licensed to prac¬ 
tice law he went to Prince William county where he 
prosecuted his profession successfully and had in 1861 
passed into the front rank of the bar of that section, 
when events took place which closed the courts and 
silenced the law for many a weary day. 

There had been signs and portents of a coming 
storm. The presidential election of 1860 had shown 
how profoundly men were moved by the issues dis¬ 
cussed in that campaign. The hand of a master has 
recently given a vivid picture of the mighty conflict 
of opinion that preceded the appeal to arms: ‘^About 
every fireside in the land, in the conversation of 
friends and neighbors, and deeper still, in the secret 
of millions of human hearts, the battle of opinion was 


General Eppa Hunt on 


15 


waging; and all men felt and saw—-with more or less 
clearness that an answer to the importunate ques¬ 
tion, Shall the nation live? was due, and not to be 
denied.” 

General Hunton was named as an elector on the 
Breckenridge ticket and maintained his cause with 
ability against the advocates of Bell and of Douglas. 
Lincoln was elected. State after State seceded. Vir¬ 
ginia called a convention to consider what course she 
should pursue, and in that crisis the people of Prince 
William county wisely turned to General Hunton. I 
shall not stop to state his position. In that fierce tide 
no man could hold a position for two consecutive days. 
Men were swept along by a force as little to be resisted 
as is the earthquake when it hurls the ocean upon the 
land, or heaves mountains upon some smiling plain. 

The convention met, and after the manner of their 
kind they debated, they talked more or less wisely and 
well. They appointed committees and the committees 
reported. They sent embassies, and their diplomacy 
came to naught; and suddenly the tempest burst upon 
us in all its wrath and fury. 

Then it was that Virginia did a thing as noble as 
history records. Indeed, in its sublime unselfishness, 
in its utter and absolute self-effacement, it is without 
a parallel. It will stand for all time as the best and 
purest sacrifice offered by the spirit of chivalry at the 
behest of honor—the spirit which gives all and asks 
for nothing in return. The people of Virginia loved 
the Union which they had done so much to create. It 
was flesh of their flesh, and bone of their bone. Her 


16 


Addresses of James Keith 


great men guided the councils and led the armies 
which won our independence; the blood of her children 
had flowed upon every battle field of the Revolution; 
her sons had framed the institutions under which they 
then lived and had influenced their growth and devel¬ 
opment. The history of Virginia was indissolubly in¬ 
terwoven and blended with that of the United States. 
She knew that upon her bared bosom contending arm¬ 
ies would meet in shock of battle; but neither the ten¬ 
der and glorious memories of the past, nor the dread 
ordeal which loomed in her path, gave her one me¬ 
mentos pause. She drew the sword and flung away 
the scabbard, and from her soil sprung a throng of 
armed men, as though it had been strewn with the 
teeth of the fabled dragon. 

General Hunton was commissioned as Colonel of the 
8th Virginia Infantry. Need I tell you what the 8th 
Virginia Infantry did? When I look around these walls 
and see the faces of so many gallant gentlemen, many 
of whom have passed from us; when I recall that with 
each of these pictures was given the story of their lives 
in a manner more worthy of the theme than I can hope 
to do; and, above all, when I look into your faces, the 
survivors of the.Army of Northern Virginia and the 
inheritors of so much glory, I feel—I know—^that it is 
in truth an idle thing to tell you about the 8th Virginia 
Infantry. Was it not a part of Pickett’s Division— 
the first division in Longstreet’s Corps—^the first corps 
in the Army of Northern Virginia? Did not Hunton 
lead it at Manassas and at Ball’s Bluff, and win for it 
and for himself imperishable glory on those famous 


General Eppa Hunton 


17 


fields, not only as a brave soldier, but as a ready, cap¬ 
able and resourceful officer? Was he not with them 
at Cold Harbour, and upon a hundred other fields of 
less renown, but which were attended by feats of arms 
and gallant deeds more than enough to adorn the an¬ 
nals of more modern wars ? Was he not at the charge 
at Gettysburg? Was human courage and fortitude 
ever put to a sterner test? Did human virtue ever 
more nobly respond to the call of duty? In the midst 
of that charge, unsurpassed in the annals of war, Gen¬ 
eral Hunton and his heroic band pressed right on to 
the enemy's line until overwhelmed by the force 
massed in front of them, the greater part of his people 
having been either killed or wounded, the survivors 
were compelled to retire. For gallant conduct on 
that fatal day Colonel Hunton, who had been sorely 
wounded, was made a Brigadier General. Think of it! 
It was not a small honor to be able to do one's duty as 
a private soldier in the Army of Northern Virginia, 
but to be promoted for gallantry in Pickett's charge at 
Gettysburg, that was an honor indeed! 

General Hunton, though greatly afflicted by a pain¬ 
ful malady which would have justified his absence 
from the field, remained with his brigade throughout 
the war, participated in the campaign of 1864, ren¬ 
dered distinguished service in front of Richmond, on 
the retreat fought with his accustomed courage and 
tenacity, and was finally made a prisoner a day or two 
before Appomattox. 

After the war he made his home in Warren ton and 
practiced law in Fauquier and the neighboring coun- 


18 


Addresses of James Keith 


ties. He was the peer of such men as Brooke, Forbes 
and Payne, Harrison, Thomas and Tucker. 

Any man of industry and good sense can make a 
good argument before a court. A trial before a jury 
calls into action all of a lawyer^s resources. It is the 
final, the crucial test. It perhaps ought not to be so, 
but the character of the lawyer has great weight be¬ 
fore a jury. General Hunton had commanded a regi¬ 
ment drawn in large part from the circuit in which he 
practiced. They were men of character and intelli¬ 
gence, and there was rarely a jury upon which some of 
them did not appear. He had shared with them the 
privation of the camp, the fatigue of the mari’h and 
the danger of battle. Small wonder was it thr-n that 
they looked to him for the facts, rather than to the 
witnesses, and for the law rather than to the court. 
War is the great touchstone of character. Soldiers 
know each other as men can never do in other walks 
of life. What higher tribute could be paid General 
Hunton than the unswerving devotion to him in peace 
of those who served with him in war. 

In 1872 he was elected to Congress where he served 
his constituents ably and faithfully for eight years. 
During this time he encountered in debate the "‘plumed 
knighP’ from Maine and suffered no disadvantage; 
and such was the position achieved by him among his 
colleagues that he was chosen a member of the Elec¬ 
toral Commission in 1877. After he retired from Con¬ 
gress he practiced law for some years and upon the 
death of our honored and lamented friend and leader, 
John S. Barbour, he was appointed to the Senate by 


General Eppa Hunt on 


19 


the Governor, and afterwards elected by the General 
Assembly to fill the unexpired term. He served his 
State ably and acceptably, and retired from public life 
at the end of his term enjoying the confidence and es¬ 
teem of all men. 

He has, indeed, played many parts in the drama of 
life. His career embraces a great era in the world's 
history. We are “a part of all that we have met." 
General Hunton was, as I have already said, a man of 
strong sense, brave, truthful, honest, sincere, and 
faithful by nature. Think of his varied experience 
acting upon and influencing such natural qualities. 
Every high thought, every noble impulse, every gener¬ 
ous emotion, every kindly action, leaves its impress 
upon us. We are '*a part of all that we have met," and 
so by degrees I have seen my dear old friend, softened 
and refined by time, grow gentle and tender as a 
woman until ripe and mellow, he has about him “all 
that should accompany old age, as honor, love, obedi¬ 
ence, troops of friends." 

He is with us yet, and I trust will be with us for a 
long time. I love to see his good gray head, and his 
face shines upon me like a benediction: and when in 
the fulness of time he is taken from us he will leave 
us an example worthy of all emulation. 

I have already trespassed too long upon your time, 
but I beg you to pardon me one word more. A lifetime 
has passed since the great events in which we shared. 
I sympathize as deeply with our soldiers, I love them 
as dearly, I am as proud of their glory and as jealous 
of their renown today as when we stood shoulder to 


20 


Addresses of James Keith 


shoulder with arms in our hands; but I realize now, 
my comrades, as I did not in those days, that the fed¬ 
eral soldier was a patriot who fought in a great cause. 
What might have been, had the result been other than 
it was, it is bootless to inquire; but this I do know, 
my friends and brothers, that the government under 
which we live is the best that the sun shines on, and 
that under it the rights of all are protected. It is not 
only the best, but the greatest of all the governments 
of the earth, and is yet, I devoutly believe, only at the 
threshold of its destiny. It too is “a part of all that 
it has met.” The mightiest event in its history is the 
war in which we bore a part. The influence of that 
titanic struggle is ineradicable. The deeds of the Con¬ 
federate soldier are mingled in the very web and woof 
of our national being, and in all our history there is no 
brighter, no nobler page, than that which records his 
undying fame. Men may like it or not, but it is there. 
In the heat and fury of that conflict we were fused into 
a nation, a nation composed of all its former parts, 
yet the whole differing essentially from any part. We 
went into the war citizens of the States; we made 
peace as citizens of the United States. Free citizens 
of a free country, let us cherish its institutions and 
instill into our children the same love of country, the 
same fervid patriotism, that inspired us in our youth! 
So we shall obey the parting order, follow the exam¬ 
ple, and honor the memory, of our immortal Lee. 

Where shall we find one whose life has more faith¬ 
fully interpreted, more nobly illustrated, this teaching 
than that of our friend and comrade whose portrait I 
now confide to your keeping. 


WILLIAM SMITH 

IMay 30, 1906.'] 

FelloW‘Citizeiis of the Commonwealth of Virginia: 

A distinguished son of Massachusetts has said of the 
Virginia of the Revolutionary period, that “We must 
go back to Athens to find another instance of a society 
so small in numbers and yet capable of such an out¬ 
burst of ability and force.” 

Into this society, in the county of King George, on 
the 6th of September, 1797, there was born William 
Smith. 

The public opinion of the day was dominated by the 
sentiments which had caused the War of Independ¬ 
ence and carried it to a successful conclusion. From 
his earliest infancy his mind was fed and his charac¬ 
ter formed with stories of heroic deeds. At the fire¬ 
side he would hear recounted incidents of the stern 
struggle for freedom in which all with whom he was 
brought into association were engaged. The mighty 
figure of Washington still lingered upon the stage; as 
did also Light-Horse Harry Lee, the hero of the south¬ 
ern campaigns, great in himself, but to be remembered 
in all coming time as the father of Robert Edward 
Lee; and Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and Marshall 
were at the zenith of their great careers while William 
Smith was in the tender and receptive days of his early 
youth. What lessons he learned! What examples he 
saw around him! What inspiration to form his ideals 


22 


Addresses of James Keith 


upon what is noble in life, and what incentives to high 
achievement! In order to rouse his ambition, to kin¬ 
dle the sacred fire in his soul, there was no need to 
turn to books of chivalry or romance, to pore over Plu¬ 
tarch's Lives or Livy's pictured page. It was a saying 
of the great Dr. Johnson, that ‘The man was little to 
be envied whose patriotism would not gain force upon 
the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow 
warmer among the ruins of Iona." If such be the force 
of environment, how great must have been its influ¬ 
ence upon a boy of ardent temperatment, of fine intel¬ 
lectual gifts, reared in such an atmosphere and among 
such surroundings! We shall see that in the breast 
of William Smith it kindled a fervid love of country 
which age could not cool, and which to the end of a 
long life, retained all its warmth, like Hecla with its 
crown of snow and heart of fire. 

Fitted by a liberal academic and professional edu¬ 
cation, on reaching man's estate he entered upon the 
practice of law, and soon attained distinction in that 
profession which along with other business pursuits 
furnished an ample field for the display of his talents 
and energies. But he was soon to be called to play a 
distinguished part in public affairs. 

In 1836 he was elected to the Senate of Virginia as 
a Democrat. He always had firmest faith in the integ¬ 
rity, the patriotism and the ultimate wisdom of the 
great body of the people. He thought the people equal 
to the task of self-government, and therefore placed 
the strictest construction upon governmental powers 
by which their freedom of action and of choice are 


William Smith 


23 


to be fettered and restrained; in other words he 
thought, with Jefferson, that the least governed were 
in the main the best governed communities, and that 
the voters, when a question of expediency or policy had 
been discussed before them, were quite capable of a 
wise and just decision. As this opinion was honestly 
cherished and consistently maintained, and as he re¬ 
posed his trust in the people, he was in turn loved .and 
trusted by them with a passionate devotion which 
knew no variableness nor shadow of turning. To vouch 
all this I have only to turn to the inscription, which 
records in bare outline the many positions of honor 
and trust he was called to fill. 

What a bu§y life it was! Time would fail me were I 
merely to catalogue the more striking incidents of a 
career so crowded with varied experiences. That in¬ 
scription tells you with the highest eloquence, because 
with truth and simplicity, the places he filled with so 
much honor to himself and such advantage to his 
country that not a moment of private life was per¬ 
mitted him. It tells you the principles and sentiments 
by which he was guided and controlled, the great 
central idea of which was, “Virginia’s inherent sov¬ 
ereignty,” which in time of peace he maintained with 
“fearless and impassioned eloquence”; and that when 
“the storm of War burst, his voice was in his sword.” 

For the men of the generation which is rapidly 
passing away, the war is and must be the one great 
over-shadowing fact. It looms up in the memory in 
such vast proportions that all else which happened 
before and since seems trivial and of little worth. 


24 


Addresses of James Keith 


More especially is this true of this day of all days, 
when North and South, and all over the land, there 
is an outpouring of the people to honor themselves by 
paying a loving tribute to the memory of our glorious, 
our happy dead—happy, because nothing can harm 
them further; while the memory of their heroic deeds, 
of their lives offered as a willing sacrifice upon the 
altar of duty, is sweeter and more fragrant far than 
the flowers with which we bestrew their honored 
graves. 

In April, 1861, the storm so long threatened burst 
upon us. The land was alive with men hurrying to 
the front. It is scarcely a figure of speech to say 
that the plow was left in its furrow, and the bride at 
the altar, by those eager to be in place when the cur¬ 
tain was rung up on the greatest tragedy of ancient 
or modern times. 

In Virginia, Manassas was the first point of con¬ 
centration, with an advanced post at Fairfax Court¬ 
house composed of a company of infantry from Fau¬ 
quier under John Quincey Marr, a cavalry company 
from Rappahannock under Captain Green, and an¬ 
other from Prince William under Captain Thornton. 
Such was the beginning of the Army of Northern 
Virginia. Drawn from all ranks and employments in 
life, it represented every social phase, condition and 
occupation, fused and welded by the seismic force of 
that tremendous upheaval into an organization whose 
deeds were predestined soon to make all the world 
wonder. 


William Smith 


25 


On the night of the 31st of May, or more accurately 
in the early morning of the 1st of June, a body of 
United States cavalry charged into Fairfax Court¬ 
house, effecting an almost complete surprise, coming 
in with the videttes whose duty it was to give warn¬ 
ing of their approach. Everything was in confusion. 
But it chanced that on the preceding evening Gov¬ 
ernor Smith, like a knight-errant in search of adven¬ 
ture, had arrived upon the scene and was spending 
the night at the house of a friend. Awakened from 
his sleep before the dawn, he quickly dressed and 
armed, and with that break-of-day courage which 
Napoleon loved and found so rare, he hurried to the 
scene of conflict. Colonel (afterwards General) Ewell 
was in command, but he being presently wounded, 
our old friend took charge. What then happened has 
always been to me a wonderful thing. It is said by 
Byron, that when you have been under fire 

“once or twice, 

The ear becomes more Irish and less nice.” 

But here we see one verging upon sixty-four years of 
age, kindly in all his dealings with his fellow-man, 
whom the gentle Cowper might well have called his 
friend for he would not needlessly have set his foot 
upon a worm; yet he springs from his bed with arms 
in his hands, and with the coolness of a veteran and 
the skill of a bom soldier at once grasps the situation, 
and by his example rallies a part of the men from the 
disorder into which they had fallen, disposes of them 
most judiciously, inspires them with a portion of his 
own courage, and finally repulses the enemy with loss. 


26 


Addresses of James Keith 


On this day, June 1st, John Quincey Marr fell in 
battle. Was he the first to fall? It is bootless to in¬ 
quire. He answered the first call of duty, and he fell 
upon the field of honor. Virginians can trust poster¬ 
ity and the contemporary opinion of foreign nations 
which, it is said, stands towards us in somewhat the 
same attitude with that of posterity and anticipates 
its judgment, to make a just award and to assign to 
us our due share in the glory of that mighty struggle. 
For that award we shall wait with serene confidence, 
and with it we shall be content, certain of this, at least, 
that there is enough and to spare for all. 

We next hear of Governor Smith as Colonel of the 
Forty-ninth Virginia Infantry at Manassas. To follow 
his career in detail would be to give the story of the 
Army of Northern Virginia. At Manassas, Williams¬ 
burg, Seven Pines, the Seven Days of battle around 
Kichmond, at Sharpsburg, at Gettysburg, he displayed 
upon greater and bloodier fields the high soldierly 
qualities of which he gave promise and earnest at 
Fairfax Courthouse. At Seven Pines we see him seize 
a fallen banner and bear it to the front, heedless of 
a storm of shot and shell; at Sharpsburg, all day upon 
the perilous edge of the fiercest battle of the war, he 
displayed the highest courage, and by his example 
lifted his men above all fear of the carnival of death, 
in the midst of which they stood unshaken during 
that awful day. Oppressed by the weight of years, 
weary from almost superhuman exertion, bleeding 
from grievous wounds, his constant soul, mounting 




William Smith 


27 


with the occasion, was careless of all save the com¬ 
mand he had received and the promise he had given 
to hold the position. Can you conceive of anything 
finer than that? And yet it is no fancy picture; it is 
cold, sober, unadorned truth. What fancy could add 
to it? Marshal Ney, reeling from wounds and ex¬ 
haustion, covered with blood, staggering into a Prus¬ 
sian town and exclaiming, am the rear guard of 
the Grand Army,’' was not a more heroic figure. 

At Gettysburg his conduct was equally admirable, 
and his readiness to perceive and promptness to meet 
situations as they disclosed themselves during the 
ever-changing fortunes of a great battle were again 
conspicuous and of inestimable value. He had that 
quickness of physical and intellectual vision which 
enabled him to see the crucial point, to catch the 
moment of a crisis, and to do the right thing at 
the right time—one of the highest attributes of a 
soldier. 

• Let us pause here for a moment. Think of what 
the Army of Northern Virginia was, of what it suf¬ 
fered and endured, and of what it achieved. To have 
belonged to that Army and to have passed through 
that fierce ordeal in any capacity however humble, 
provided one did his duty, is warrant for no small 
meed of praise—that Army of which an eloquent his¬ 
torian of its great adversary, the Army of the Potomac, 
has said: ‘'Who can ever forget that once looked upon 
that array of tattered uniforms and bright muskets, 
that body of incomparable infantry, the Army of 
Northern Virginia, which for four years carried the 



28 


Addresses of James Keith 


revolt upon its bayonets, opposing a constant front to 
the mighty concentration of power brought against it, 
which receiving terrible blows did not fail to give the 
like, and which vital in all its parts died only with its 
annihilation/^ What then of the man who joined it 
at sixty-four and without military training, by sheer 
force of his own high qualities, won his way to the 
rank of Major-General under the eye and with the 
approval of Robert E. Lee; and whose conduct in 
battle extorted the warm admiration of that Rhada- 
manthine judge, General Jubal A. Early? Their ap¬ 
probation was praise indeed. 

In the spring of 1863 he was for a second time elected 
Governor. During his first term in that office, to which 
he was chosen by the legislature in 1845, he discharged 
his duties in a most satisfactory manner. There is 
one circumstance of that administration to whicn 
I wish to call particular attention. In the various 
schemes for constructing works of internal improve¬ 
ment, a subject which then engaged to a great de¬ 
gree the attention of the people of this State, he 
advocated a system which would have promoted the 
unity and solidarity of all sections of our Common¬ 
wealth, and which converging upon Richmond was de¬ 
signed to make this city the commercial as well as the 
political capital of the Commonwealth. He contem¬ 
plated the construction of railroads from the western 
and northwestern parts of the State which would have 
had a strong tendency to diminish, if not to obviate, 
the disposition towards separation along those natural 
lines of cleavage, the Alleghany mountains. Other 



William Smith 


29 


counsels prevailed, other plans were adopted, the in¬ 
terests of the western part of the State were alienated 
from us; and. When the time of stress came Virginia 
was dismembered, and she who had created the Union 
of States was torn asunder by her offspring. 

Succeeding Governor Letcher, who had during three 
years of war been our zealous, able and patriotic Chief 
Magistrate, Governor Smith, on January 1, 1864, en¬ 
tered upon his second term. The strain upon the 
nerves, the energies and the resources of our people 
was terrific. Already the seemingly impossible had 
been accomplished. Vast armies had been raised and 
equipped. The enemy with equal ardor and with un¬ 
stinted abundance of men and supplies to draw upon, 
came again and again to the attack with unwearied, 
unabated constancy. Our men in the field must be fed, 
and the supplies must be drawn from those at home 
who were themselves in want. The commonest neces¬ 
saries of life were exhausted. There are men here to¬ 
day who lived and toiled and fought on four ounces of 
raw pork and one-half a pound of coarse corn meal a 
day. I myself, to relieve the hunger of a gallant in¬ 
fantryman, have robbed my horse of his scant supply 
of unshelled corn. 

Governor Smith was called upon to take office under 
these appalling conditions. The tide of war had for 
three long years swept over the land, but his undaunted 
soul was in unison with the unshaken fortitude, the 
unfaltering resolution, of our people. He bent every 
energy, he strained every nerve, to alleviate the wants 
of the people, to supply the absolute needs of the army. 


30 


Addresses of James Keith 


So long as rations and cartridges could be supplied he 
knew that the thin gray line of steel- which hedged us 
about could be trusted to keep the enemy at bay, to 
‘‘carry the revolt upon its bayonets f and with all his 
heart he set himself to his task. With absolute unsel¬ 
fishness, with perfect singleness of purpose, he toiled 
at his more than herculean labor. He had no friend 
to serve, no enemy to punish. The cry of his soul to 
God was, that he might serve his people. All that man 
could do he did. He seized upon every material re¬ 
source that was within his reach; he rekindled the 
spirit of our people; he reanimated the courage of our 
soldiers. But he could not reverse “the fix’d events of 
Fate’s remote decrees.” 

It is a pleasing and yet an idle thing to speculate 
upon what might have been could we reconstruct the 
past and cause things to happen otherwise than as they 
actually occurred. What might have been had Fate 
called Governor Smith to a wider and a higher field of 
action; to guide the destinies, not of a State, but of 
many States, through that titanic struggle? 

The war ended, he returned to his home in Fauquier 
where he lived in dignified retirement broken more 
than once by the voice of the people who demanded 
his services in the legislature. His hospitable home 
was always open, and there he spent the peaceful even¬ 
ing of his days. He had lived a long life filled with 
great events. Indeed the chief difficulty in speaking 
of him is to select, where material is so abundant. 
Almost coeval in time with the adoption of the Con¬ 
stitution of the United States, the story of his life 







William Smith 


31 


involves the history of his country, which he served 
in the Legislature of the State, in the Congress of the 
United States, as the executive of the State in time of 
peace and again in time of war. He might truthfully 
have said with old .i^^neas, 

^‘quaeque ipse miserrima vidi, 

Et quorum pars magna fuiJ* 

He outlived every antagonism, he hushed every dis¬ 
cord, and when his end came he was at perfect peace 

with his God and his fellow-^man. 

\ ■ , 

rf > ' 

> • 

no distemper, of no blast he died, 

But fell like autumn fruit that mellow’d long,— 

Even wonder’d at, because he dropped no sooner. 

Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore years. 

Yet freshly ran he on ten winters more; 

Till like a clock worn out with eating time. 

The wheels of weary life at last stood still.” 

And now we are gathered to unveil a monument to 
his memory. To erect monuments that we may per¬ 
petuate the memory of noble deeds seems to me an 
inversion of the true order of things. It is striving 
to make the perishable bear witness to that which is 
imperishable; to call upon that which is earthy to keep 
alive that which is spiritual and immortal. You may 
stand at the tomb of Achilles and hear Troy doubted. 
Gone are its towers and battlements, its stately tem¬ 
ples and gorgeous palaces, but the Iliad which tells 
the story of its siege and fall is as fresh to-day as it 
was three thousand years ago. This bronze will yield 


32 


Addresses of James Keith 


to the remorseless touch of time, this granite pedestal 
will crumble into dust; but the influence of a noble life 
is never lost, nor its memory wholly forgotten, until 
that day when— 

“The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces. 

The solemn temples, the great globe itself. 

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve. 

And, like an insubstantial pageant faded. 

Leave not a rack behind.” 


R. TAYLOR SCOTT 

Richmond Bar Association. 
iOcU>heT 16, 1897,'] 

I have been requested to present the memorial and 
resolutions of your committee upon the life and char¬ 
acter of the Hon. R. Taylor Scott whose lamented death 
deprived this Association of one of its most honored 
members, this Commonwealth of one of her most dis¬ 
tinguished and patriotic citizens, and his friends of 
one who was ever wise, faithful and true in all his 
relations to and dealings with them. For myself I 
cannot recall the time when the ties that bound us 
together were first formed. In the very dawn of my 
memory he was my friend, and so remained amid all 
the vicissitudes of life without ‘‘variableness or shadow 

of turning’^ until he was called to enjoy, I trust, in a 
higher state of existence, the reward of a life devoted 

to the faithful discharge of every duty. 

I shall have no occasion to exaggerate his virtues; 
I need not indeed indulge in those terms of eulogy 
which custom sanctions when we are speaking of the 
dead. I have but to tell you the story of his life to 
portray to you the man as he walked among us and as 
I knew him to be, so brave in adversity, so modest in 
prosperity, so true to every trust, so just and upright 
in all his dealings, whose life was governed by prin¬ 
ciple and who walked with conscience as his guide. 


34 


Addresses of James Keith 


Had I the art to tell you to-day the simple truth you 
would know that it might be well said of him, ^'this 
earth that bears thee dead, bears not alive"' a truer 
gentleman. 

On behalf of your committee I have the honor of 
presenting the following memorial and resolutions: 

Robert Taylor Scott was the son of Robert Eden 
Scott whose reputation as a statesman and lawyer is 
a part of the history of this Commonwealth, and who 
met his death in 1862 in the chivalric endeavor to pro¬ 
tect the defenseless women and children of Fauquier 
from the depredations of deserters and marauders who 
infested that section. His grandfather was Judge 
John Scott who has had few equals and no superiors 
upon the bench of this State. 

His mother was Elizabeth Taylor, daughter of 
Robert I. Taylor, of Alexandria, of whom Chief Justice 
Marshall once said that his arguments were models of 
excellence; “he never said one word too much, or a 
word too little." His mother died when he was only a 
few days old, but this can scarcely be reckoned in his 
case as a misfortune for he was nurtured and reared 
in the family of his father's mother, a woman worthy 
to have been a Roman matron in Rome's palmiest days. 
He was educated in the schools of Warrenton and 
Alexandria and for a time at a private school in his 
father's house, and in 1851 he entered at the Univer¬ 
sity of Virginia where he remained for four sessions. 

Having thus acquired an excellent classical and pro¬ 
fessional education he, in 1856, commenced the practice 

of law in Warrenton. He succeeded from the first, 


R. Taylor Scott 


35 


and in 1857 he married Miss Frances Carter, eldest 
daughter of Richard H. Carter of Fauquier. 

In 1861 upon the breaking out of the war he organ¬ 
ized a company of infantry of which he was the Cap¬ 
tain and which was mustered into service with the 
Eighth Virginia Regiment under Eppa Hunton as its 
Colonel, and served with it until he was put upon the 
staff of his kinsman. General George E. Pickett, with 
the rank of Major, where he remained until 1865. The 
war ended, he returned to Warrenton and at once 
entered upon a lucrative practice. In 1867 he was 
elected a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, 
and in 1881 was chosen to represent the counties of 
Loudoun and Fauquier in the General Assembly. In 
1889 he was nominated for the position of Attorney- 
General, was renominated in 1893, and was on both 
occasions elected by great majorities. He was a can¬ 
didate for a third nomination under circumstances 
v/hich encouraged his friends to believe that he would 
be chosen to succeed himself, when in the midst of his 
career, in the very prime of his intellectual manhood, 
the ‘‘icy hands of death’’ were laid upon him. 

This in bare outline is a record of the life of a man 
whose career is as instructive as an example to others, 
now that he is gone, as it was full of activity and fruit¬ 
ful of results while he lived. 

He deserved and enjoyed in a high degree the affec¬ 
tion and esteem of a wide circle of friends, and the 
confidence and respect of this entire Commonwealth. 
He was called upon to serve his State as a soldier, as 
a legislator, and as Attorney-General, and in every 


36 


Addresses of James Keith 


station his courage, his industry, his zeal, his integrity, 
his strong, good sense enabled him to discharge the 
varied duties confided to his care so as to promote the 
public good, and to add surely and steadily to his repu¬ 
tation and to the estimation in which he was held by 
his fellow-citizens. He was, as has already been said, 
a man of strong, good sense and of untiring industry. 
He early learned “to scorn delights and live laborious 
days.’’ ‘ 

In his social relations he v/as as kind, as gentle and 
as tender as a woman, but no man was bolder or more 
aggressive in presenting the cause of a client or in the 
discharge of a duty. It has been said that when “we 
come to die it is not of what we have done for our¬ 
selves, but of what we have done for others that we 
think most pleasantly on.” What pleasant memories 
then were his, for no accusing spirit can bear witness 
against him that “I was an hungered, and ye gave me 
no meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink; I 
was a stranger, and ye took me not in; naked, and ye 
clothed me not; sick and in prison, and ye visited me 
not,” for he had ever “a tear for pity and a hand open 
as day for melting charity.” 

When on the sixth day of August last, surrounded 
by a devoted family and by loving friends, the final 
summons came, “soothed and sustained by an unfalter¬ 
ing trust” in the infinite mercy of God, “he wrapped 
the drapery of his couch about him and lay down to 
pleasant dreams.” 


R. Taylor Scott 


37 


Therefore be it Resolved, That this Association 
record its sincere sorrow at the death of Major R. 
Taylor Scott, one of its most eminent and most beloved 
members. It deplores his death not only as a personal 
bereavement to his associates, among whom he was 
held in the highest esteem, but as a loss to the pro¬ 
fession which he honored, and to the Commonwealth 
whose interests he ever stood ready to promote with 
patriotic devotion. 

Resolved, That copies of this memorial and resolu¬ 
tion be furnished by the Secretary of the Association 
to the family of the deceased, and that the Chairman 
of this meeting appoint one or more lawyers to present 

I 

the same to the courts. State and Federal, of the city 
with the request that they be spread upon their 
records. 


JUDGE HENRY W. THOMAS 


Accepting His Portrait. 

Friends of the County of Fairfax: 

I am glad to be once again among those from whom 

during so many years I was the recipient of nothing 
but kindness and consideration; I am glad to be with 
you on this occasion when we are met together to do 
honor, not to the dead but to the living, by showing 
that if we cannot rival those who have gone before, 
we can cherish the example they have given us, that 
we are grateful for the rich heritage of civil and 
political liberty they have bequeathed to us, and that 
our hearts still pay tribute and homage to wisdom and 
virtue which we dare not hope to emulate. 

It is my pleasing duty to receive for you the picture 
of one who in life was known by all in this community, 
and whom to know was to love and esteem. Not that 
he was without faults. I would not do violence to 
justice in speaking of him. Of all men he was the 
last to desire indiscriminate eulogy, and few men have 
stood less in need of it. If I had the art to paint him 
as I knew him I would show you a man with many 
kindly, amiable weaknesses, but so full of sympathy 
for others, so generous a friend, so magnanimous a 
foe, that of Judge Thomas it might well be said that 
even his failings leaned to virtue’s side. 




Judge Henry W. Thorms 


39 


He filled many positions of public trust. He served 
with distinction in both Houses of the General Assem¬ 
bly. He was Second Auditor of the State during the 
war. He was appointed one of the Court of Concilia¬ 
tion which sat in Richmond upon the close of the war. 
He was for several years the Judge of this Circuit, 
and was afterwards elected Lieutenant-Governor by 
the Legislature; and he discharged the varied duties 
which thus devolved upon him, in the legislative, execu¬ 
tive, and judicial departments of the State govern¬ 
ment, with conspicuous ability and unquestioned in¬ 
tegrity. 

Wherever we go and whatever we do in this life, we 
must carry v/ith us the nature which has been im¬ 
planted in us. We seem to be pitched upon a certain 
key which dominates and gives character to every 
note and tone of our being. Judge Thomas was a very 
able man and he was a very able Judge. I remember 
hearing Judge Robertson, one of the ablest men who 
ever adorned the Bench of Virginia, speak of him in 
high, indeed I might say exalted, terms of commenda¬ 
tion, and recalling his judicial career I hazard noth¬ 
ing in saying that he was a worthy successor of Dade, 
of Scott and of Tyler. What more need be said? In 
whatever position he was placed, nature controlled 
him. He listened, perhaps too readily, to appeals to his 
sympathy and pity; he was, it may be, too prone to 
temper justice with mercy, and he might have been a 
greater judge had he been a colder and a harder man— 
had there been in him less of the milk of human 
kindness. 


40 


Addresses of James Keith 


That softness of disposition, that sweetness and 
gentleness of character, was the key upon which the 
man, that particular instrument of God's handiwork, 
was pitched. Looking alone to his intellectual equip¬ 
ment, to his attainments as a lawyer, and to his acqui¬ 
sitions in literature—for he had read a great deal and 
with excellent taste and judgment—looking, I repeat, 
to the intellectual side of his character only, the wonder 
is that he did not achieve higher position and a wider 
and more enduring reputation. I think it was because 
he was not selfish enough. He was ambitious but he 
would not gratify his ambition if in order to do so it 
was necessary to wound a friend or to crush a foe. 
^‘Ambition should be made of sterner stuff" than was 
the heart of our friend. 

I trust I may be pardoned for a personal reminis¬ 
cence. As most of you know. Judge Thomas and I 
were candidates in 1870 for the judgeship of this cir¬ 
cuit. It is not necessary to explain how my candidacy 
arose. Judge Thomas was under political disabilities; 
when they were removed the fight was on and I could 
not, or at least did not, withdraw; and the Legislature 
very imprudently elected me. In a few weeks I had 
to hold court here. I looked forward with no little 
apprehension to meeting Judge Thomas. On my ar¬ 
rival he came to me and said: ‘T have had some expe¬ 
rience as a judge and know something of the difficul¬ 
ties you encounter, and if I can at any time serve you, 
nothing will give me greater pleasure." It was an act 
of magnanimity as rare as it was admirable, and the 
memory of it will shine in my heart while I live. 


Judge Henry W. Thomas 


41 


From that day we were friends, and therefore it is 
that I am here. 

You do well to cherish his memory. How little of us 
survives, and for how short a time! 

“That best portion of a good man’s life 
His little, nameless, unremembered acts 
Of kindness and of love,” 

find no enduring record here, and we are ever re¬ 
minded of that line of infinite pathos with which one 
of the greatest of living actors can stir the coldest 
heart, 


“How soon we are forgot, 

When we are gone.” 

May this picture, which recalls so vividly the 
strength and benignity of his countenance as it looks 
down from the walls of this historic court room, keep 
green in the memory of coming generations the name 
and fame of Henry W. Thomas! 


SIR HENRY IRVING 


Banquet of British Society. 

[January 19, 1896.'] 

Mr. President and Gentlemen: 

First let me thank you for the opportunity given me 
to meet your distinguished guest—the greatest living 
interpreter of the greatest of all poets and dramatists. 
I do not know that I am so grateful to you for having 
selected me to respond to the toast just announced. 
Not but that it is a great theme. It is a noble theme, 
and I love and am proud of this, my native land, so 
rich in inherited glory, and richer still in the infinite 
possibilities which the long vista of the coming cen¬ 
turies opens out before us. 

For a single moment permit me to direct your minds 
to the past, and as we travel back along the stream of 
time we find that we have not far to go ere the great 
body of the people of these United States are mingled 
with those from whom they sprung, and our traditions, 
our history, and our institutions are yours. It is but 
yesterday in the life of a nation when our fathers and 
your fathers owed allegiance to the same sovereign, 
and when the time for separation came it was only 
the political connection which was severed, leaving the 
whole fabric of government, the whole social structure, 
in the main unaffected. 




Sir Henry Irving 


43 


Indeed, this could not but be so. We had a common 
origin, we spoke a common language, we drew our 
moral and intellectual inspiration from the same 
sources, and our religion flowed from the same great 
source of truth. Our fathers had, as one people, 
civil and religious liberty. Together they had wrested 
from the hand of arbitrary power those great muni¬ 
ments of freedom which to-day stand not only as the 
bulwarks of the liberty which we enjoy, but whose 
blessings are being diffused among and shared by so 
large a proportion of mankind; together they drank 
from Chaucer, that ^‘well of English, pure and unde- 
filed,’^ delighted in the fancy and musical rhythm of 
the “Faerie Queen,*’ felt the charm of “rare Ben 
Jonson;” and, most wonderful of all, together they 
must have stood entranced and amazed at the genius 
of Shakespeare, that greatest but one of all the revela¬ 
tions of God to man, as Macbeth and Lear, and Hamlet 
and Shylock, called into what promises to be immortal 
life, passed before them upon the stage. He is to us, 
as to his contemporaries, “the applause, delight, and 
wonder of the stage.” It was our Milton who sang 
that grand, majestic song which tells of “man’s first 
disobedience and the fruit of that forbidden tree, whose 
mortal taste brought death into the world,” and who 
in physical blindness had his soul illumined with ex¬ 
cess of light divine, and could see— 

“The living throne, the sapphire blaze, 

Where angels tremble while they gaze.” 


44 


Addresses of James Keith 


It was our Bacon who gave law to thought and inves¬ 
tigation; who turned the minds of men from a fruit¬ 
less scholasticism and showed them the realms of 
nature to be conquered by patient labor, and her great 
forces made subservient to the needs and the luxuries 
of mankind; and it was our Newton of whom it has 
been said that— 

^‘Nature and nature’s laws lay hid in night; 

God said let Newton be, and all was light.” 

The story would be endless, a mere catalogue of the 
great names would consume the evening, and time 
would fail me to recall the great deeds of great Eng¬ 
lishmen, or rather of great Anglo-Saxons, which thrill 
the hearts of millions of children and of English-speak¬ 
ing men and women who never saw, nor ever shall 
see, the white cliffs and green fields of old England. 
Our children still ride on a '^cock-horse to Banbury 
Cross,” and to them Cornwall is still the land of ogres, 
and of "Jack the Giant-killer,” while in Sherwood 
Forest I am sure I would expect to see Robin Hood or 
Little John, or disturb, it may be, the revelries of King 
Richard and Friar Tuck. 

It would not do for me to omit some mention of my 
Lord Coke and of Sir William Blackstone. Their in¬ 
fluence upon our jurisprudence cannot be estimated. 
The decisions of the one and the commentaries of the 
other are woven into the very web and woof of our 
laws and institutions, and it would scarcely be an ex¬ 
aggeration to say that, more than Parliament or Con- 


45 


Sir Henry Irving 

gress, more than State legislatures, do the influence 
and regulate the daily intercourse and affairs of men; 
and, lastly, not longer to weary you by recalling what 
must be as familiar in your mouths as household 
words, I shall put in a claim, to share with you in the 
fame of one other class of men who did great deeds in 
the cause of human liberty. I refer to a class of whom 
Wycliffe was the type and forerunner; he whose ashes, 
cast into the Avon, have spread the seeds of truth wide 
as the waters be. 

“The Avon to the Severn runs, 

The Severn to the sea. 

And Wycliffe’s dust shall spread abroad 
Wide as the waters be.’^ 

What a glorious prophesy, and yet more glorious 
fulfilment! All those men, the great deeds they 
wrought and the great events in which they figured, 
are as much a part of our inheritance as of yours. 
They lived and wrought and went to their reward 
before the political bonds which had constituted us 
one people were severed, and when that most stupend¬ 
ous event occurred, and these United States took their 
place in the great family of nations, this priceless 
heritage was still ours. 

It is our boast that our talent has been well em¬ 
ployed, and that we have made great and noble con¬ 
tributions to it. We shall be pardoned for feeling a 
just pride in those political institutions which, pre¬ 
serving what is best, lopping off that which was useless 
or harmful, and engrafting upon them those prin- 


46 


Addresses of James Keith 


ciples of constitutional and representative govern- 
iment, which we claim as purely American in their 
origin and adaptation, have rendered civil liberty at 
least more secure, if not more complete, by the addi¬ 
tional safeguards which have been thrown around our 
political liberty. 

Why is it that these United States have so pros¬ 
pered? We are not the only colonists of the New 
World. Before an Anglo-Saxon's foot had touched 
this continent another European power, far greater 
than Great Britain, had asserted and established her 
right of dominion over countless islands of the Western 
ocean, and Cortez and Pizarro had drenched Mexico 
and Peru with the blood of whole nations who perished 
in defence of their homes and firesides. They served 
a master who aspired to universal dominion, into 
whose coffers poured the wealth of the known world, 
whose pride and power were never curbed or checked 
until his boasted infantry perished in the ditches, and 
at the hands, of the bold burghers of the Netherlands, 
and until his proud Armada, which threatened the 
realm of England, went down before the guns of 
Howard and of Drake. 

As I have said, the Spaniard was here before we 
were. He established colonies as well as we. Now, 
Mr. President and gentlemen, see what the two peo¬ 
ples have done. They had the start of us. But look 
at a South American republic—^look, if you please, 
at Venezuela—and then for a moment turn your gaze 
upon us. Compare the two pictures. Is it not indeed 
Hyperion to a Satyr? There is, of course, a cause for 


Sir Henry Irving 


47 


it all. What is it? It is not to be found in soil or 
climate, nor in any of the things we call natural con¬ 
ditions. Nowhere on earth has Providence been more 
bountiful of all His riches and blessings than in Cuba 
and Mexico and South America. 

Nor is it wholly due to political conditions, though 
they have been largely contributory to the result, for 
Mexico and South America have tried by turns every 
form of so-called government from anarchy to despot¬ 
ism, while a new republic is born almost every day in 
the week. To my mind the reason for it is to be found 
in the retrospective view which we took of the origin 
and growth of the institutions and laws—political, 
civil, and religious—institutions and laws which have 
moulded and established our character, which have 
made us in the main a law-respecting, law-abiding, 
law-loving people; which have inspired us, on the one 
hand, with that love of liberty which forbids us to owe 
allegiance to any prince or potentate but to the law 
only, and at the same time have implanted in us that 
love of social order which compels us to respect and 
obey the law; and as a result we have liberty con¬ 
trolled by law. 

There is another factor to be considered, too occult 
for discussion here, for it is the result of forces which 
have been in operation since the advent of man upon 
this planet. I refer to mere differences of race. These 
differences are, to my mind at least, facts of supreme 
importance, which cannot safely be eliminated from 
the consideration of the subject with which we are 
dealing. It is certain that the Anglo-Saxon brought 


48 


Addresses of James Keith 


with him here, and carries with him wherever he goes, 
a faculty for organization and government which be¬ 
longs in the same degree to no other people. On this 
continent his colonies have become States, and States 
have become a mighty empire, assuring to the many 
millions of to-day, and I trust to countless millions of 
souls yet unborn, the blessings of liberty guarded by 
law. 

In the southern hemisphere we have seen colonists 
of English-speaking people discovering new continents 
and establishing the supremacy of British law and in¬ 
stitutions. If a trading company gets a foothold in 
India—the cradle of our race—or in darkest Africa a 
colony is founded, the instinct of organization asserts 
itself, a new nation is born, and a new jewel is added 
to the British crown. Shall we, with a common line¬ 
age, a common history, joint inheritors of a glorious 
past, fly at each other's throats and go to war? By 
all the gods it would be a glorious war. The same 
blood is in our veins that was shed at Crecy and at 
Agincourt, at Bannockburn and on Flodden Field, at 
Edge Hill and Marston Moor, at Blenheim and at Mal- 
plaquet, while you would have to meet as well the 
men who charged .up the heights of Gettysburg as 
those, no less brave, who with unshaken firmness met 
and rolled back that dreadful tide of war on that never- 
to-be-forgotten day. There can be no war between 
us; there will be no war if our councils are guided by 
wisdom and moderation. In the wisdom and modera¬ 
tion of this Government, as administered by Mr. 


Sir Henry Irving 


49 


Cleveland, I have an abiding confidence. He will be 
met, I trust and believe, in a like spirit. 

Then, let these two great peoples, marching shoulder 
to shoulder in the vanguard of the nations, diffuse the 
blessings which they enjoy, and know hereafter no 
rivalry save a generous emulation to hasten the coming 
of that day when the— 


“War-drum throbs no longer and the battle flags are furled 
In the parliament of man, the federation of the world!” 



Mr. JUSTICE LURTON 

At Washington, D. C. 

We are here to give expression to our satisfaction at 
the elevation of Mr. Justice Lurton to a seat upon the 
Supreme Court. 

He has won his way to that high office from the posi¬ 
tion of Chancellor of the State of Tennessee. His pro¬ 
motion has been by just gradations, and at each step 
he has received and deserved the approbation due to 
an able, an independent and an incorruptible judge. 

Ours is an indissoluble Union of indestructible 
States, and it is meet and fitting that one who has dis¬ 
played distinguished ability in the courts of the State 
should be translated to that highest court, which is 
the roof and crown of our governmental structure. 

Whoever fills a judicial office is under the highest 
obligation to society faithfully to discharge its duties. 
The humblest magistrate, within the sphere of his 
jurisdiction, passes upon rights of person and prop¬ 
erty as important by comparison to those to be affected 
by his judgment and as sacred in their essential nature 
as are those submitted to the tribunal upon whose de¬ 
crees a nation waits with bated breath. Every judge 
who gives an honest judgment has done that which, 
in a greater or less degree, tends to strengthen the con¬ 
fidence and faith of his fellow-man in the institutions 
under which he lives, and to confirm his respect for 
and obedience to the law of the land. 


Mr. Justice Lurton 


51 


This high sense of duty has been illustrated in times 
past by many eminent judges of the court of which I 
have the honor to a member. I shall not be deemed 
invidious in referring by name to Edmund Pendleton, 
the first president of that court, noTYieu praeclo/rum et 
venerabile —a peer among that group of men who, born 
for the occasion, won the liberties and established the 
Government of the United States, and sent it forth on 
a career which no man can contemplate without 
amazement and gratitude. 

Spencer Roane was a member of that Court, and 
there is reason to believe that had the vacancy in the 
office of Chief Justice of the United States occurred 
after the 4th of March, 1801, he and not John Marshall 
would have been appointed. He was a man of great 
strength of mind and force of character, and if the 
influence of Marshall as a counterpoise to that of Jef¬ 
ferson upon the development of our institutions, then 
in a plastic and formative condition, had been wanting, 
and that great office had been administered by Spencer 
Roane, who was with Jefferson heart and soul, who 
can tell what might have resulted from the conjunction 
of such forces? Heaven willed it otherwise. John 
Marshall came to the place for which he was born; 
Cohen V. Virginia was decided; the Supreme Court at 
once became the final arbiter of all constitutional ques¬ 
tions; the Constitution and laws of the United States 
made in pursuance thereof became the supreme law 
of the land, in fact as well as in name, as they never 
would have been but for that mighty judgment, and 
the Fourteenth Amendment, going back to Runnymede 
and incorporating into our Constitution the great prin- 



52 


Addresses of James Keith 


ciple of Magna Charta, that no person shall be de¬ 
prived of life, liberty or property without due process 
of law, or be denied the equal protection of the laws, 
brings every human right within the jurisdiction and 
under the protection of the Supreme Court. Every 
line, every letter of the Fourteenth Amendment is dyed 
and steeped in the blood of patriots, but I for one doubt 
not that the day will come when every man who be¬ 
lieves in order, every man who loves liberty, but liberty 
regulated by law, will thank God that it is an ineradi¬ 
cable part of the supreme law of the land. 

What power, coupled with what responsibility, rests 
upon the Supreme Court! Presidents and their poli¬ 
cies appear, live their brief day and disappear; but the 
Supreme Court abides with us always. In the past, it 
has been the crowning glory of our institutions— 
**Manet, mansurumque est in animis hominum, in 
aeternitate temporum!” 


WAR FLAG OF THE POWHATAN TROOP. 

Presented to 'The Daughters of Powhatan/' 

I have been deputed by the "Powhatan Troop" to 
present to you this historic banner. It was the gift of 
the ladies of Powhatan county to the "Powhatan 
Troop" in 1860 when Philip St. George Cocke, a gal¬ 
lant soldier and patriotic gentleman, afterwards a 
general officer in the armies of the Confederate States, 
was its captain. In 1861 upon the breaking out of the 
war this troop hurried to the front in defense of their 
altars and firesides, and was mustered into active ser¬ 
vice beneath its folds. It has upon it a painting of 
Pocahontas and an inscription which must have stirred 
the hearts of those brave boys of Powhatan like the 
peal of a trumpet—"Guards of the Daughters of 
Powhatan." 

When the troop became a part of the Fourth Vir¬ 
ginia Cavalry this banner was returned to Powhatan 
county where it has ever since been jealously guarded 
as a valued memorial of happier times. Time would 
fail me to recount the deeds of this troop under the 
gallant Lay, under Charles Old, beloved, honored and 
esteemed by all as the gentlest and truest of men and 
as a soldier of approved courage, and under Joseph 
Hobson, now present, whose modesty would be offended 
were I this day to do him simple justice. 


54 


Addresses of James Keith 


This flag recalls an incident in the infancy of this 
Commonwealth, which, though it may not be accepted 
as true by the muse of History, is established in the 
hearts of all Virginians, and is, to say the least, a 
beautiful legend. 

A long time ago, at no great distance from the spot 
upon which we stand, a prisoner was brought to trial. 
It was a memorable occasion. On the seat of justice 
sat Powhatan surrounded by his warriors. On either 
side of him were his daughters, while at the bar await¬ 
ing his doom stood John Smith, the founder of this 
Commonwealth. The trial was brief, the death sen¬ 
tence was pronounced, and Powhatan, but now the 
judge, was eager to be a witness of its execution. The 
head of Smith was placed upon the stone that stood 
prepared. The great war club was uplifted, but ere 
it fell a beauteous maiden sprang forward, threw her¬ 
self upon the body of the helpless victim, and with 
streaming eyes pleaded for mercy. The club was 
stayed in mid-air. That touch of nature which makes 
the whole world kin had found its way to the heart of 
Powhatan, and John Smith was saved. 

That was in the morning twilight of Virginia’s his¬ 
tory. That was the first court held in this Common¬ 
wealth of which there is any record, and in its presence 
met John Smith, the first of Virginia’s long line of 
heroes, and Pocahontas the first of Virginia’s daugh¬ 
ters of whom history or even tradition speaks. 
Whence came that sudden impulse; how was this un¬ 
tutored daughter of a savage race moved to do this 
gentle deed which has been through all these ages 
shining down upon us? It may be that her soul had 



War Flag of the Powhatan Troop 


55 


communed with the Great Spirit in the unbroken soli¬ 
tude amidst which she was reared, had worshipped 
Him in the stream, in the wind or in the cloud, and 
pity’s gentle flame had thus been kindled in her breast 
as ‘^star to star vibrates light.” We cannot always 
know the means God uses to accomplish His ends, but 
we do know that the will to do every good and noble 
deed that is done comes from Him who alone is the 
fountain from which all good comes, and so believing 
we know that it was He who in His own time and in 
His own way touched the heart of that Virginian 
maiden on that auspicious day. 

I love to think of and to dwell upon her as the first 
Virginian woman, for she is typical of those who came 
after her. Since that time three centuries have passed 
and Virginia has played a great part in the world’s 
history, and Virginia’s sons have done great deeds, and 
always there have been the daughters of Virginia 
crowning them with laurel in victory and sharing with 
them the bitterness of defeat. 

It was a sacred trust that was confided to those for 
whom this flag was wrought, and well have they 
borne themselves in their high office of ‘'Guardians 
of the Daughters of Powhatan.” It may be that 
I have this day been honored with the duty of present¬ 
ing this flag on behalf of the Powhatan Troop to the 
Association of which you are the President because 
I could bear witness to the manner in which that trust 
has been fulfilled. It has been my fortune to see the 
Troop, of which my comrades now before you are the 
survivors, upon many a stricken field "where the 
ranks were rolled in vapor and the wind was laid 


56 


Addresses of James Keith 


with sound/^ They were a part of the Army of 
Northern Virginia and joint inheritors of its glory. 
When that has been said it is enough. 

Take then this banner! You have heard its story, 
you know what romantic, what tender memories and 
associations are suggested by it and cluster around 
it. Cherish it among your most precious relics, and 
may the sons of Powhatan in all coming time be faith¬ 
ful guardians of her daughters, and may the daugh¬ 
ters still point the way and prove an inspiration to 
every noble and generous deed I 


JUSTICE. 


At a Banquet Tendered the General Assembly by 
THE Richmond Chamber of Commerce. 

**Justice: It is the end of government; the end of civil 
society. It has been and ever will be pursued until 
it is obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pur~ 
suit:* 

[January, 1896.1 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: 

You have done me the honor to ask me to respond 
to the toast just announced. The subject itself would 
be sufficient to cause me to approach it with unaffected 
distrust and apprehension, but when I contemplate 
the audience before whom I stand, when I see before 
me the honored Executive of the State, the members 
of the General Assembly, in whose honor this sump¬ 
tuous banquet has been spread by the munificent hos¬ 
pitality of our hosts, and when in addition to all these 
I observe so many citizens worthily representing the 
character and intelligence of this beautiful and be¬ 
loved city, I confess that I should be wholly unable to 
proceed were it not for the confidence I feel that I 
stand before those good and great enough to season 
justice with mercy. 

"‘Justice'^ considered as the end or purpose of gov¬ 
ernment, and as the principal object of society, must 


58 


Addresses of James Keith 


have a far wider significance than that definition 
which confines it to the administration of justice by 
courts and juries. By justice, as one of the attributes 
of government and of society, I understand a prin¬ 
ciple of action all pervasive in its obligation, which 
requires of the legislature the enactment of wise and 
just laws that shall insure to every individual upon 
whom they operate the equal protection of the law, 
and equal opportunity to enjoy life, liberty and prop¬ 
erty; which imposes upon them the duty diligently to 
inform themselves of any inequality in the operation 
and enforcement of the laws, and intelligently to apply 
the remedy, whether the defect exist in the law itself 
or in the instrumentalities by which it is to be en¬ 
forced, and the further duty to provide laws which 
shall foster virtue and punish vice. 

Justice requires of the law-making power to remove 
as far as possible the example and temptation to evil, 
and to afford opportunities for the encouragement and 
exercise of virtue. 

Of the Executive^—and I crave pardon, both of His 
Excellency and of the General Assembly for thus pre¬ 
suming to touch upon their duties—of the Executive, 
justice in the broad sense in which I am endeavoring 
to present it, requires that he inform himself and 
acquaint the General Assembly with the wants of the 
people of the Commonwealth, and suggest to them 
appropriate remedies for any deficiency in the law 
as it stands which may come to his notice. It requires 




Justice 


59 


of him that existing laws shall be faithfully executed 
and, lastly, justice reposes in him the pleasing attribute 
of mercy which— 

“Is mightiest in the mightiest; and becomes 
The throned monarch better than his crown.” 

I feel a particular delicacy in speaking of justice as 
administered by the courts, for obvious reasons. All 
that has been said as to the obligation which it im¬ 
poses applies, if possible, with still greater force to 
the judiciary, its chosen and consecrated ministers. 
In all civilized societies courts are organized for en¬ 
forcing the laws designed to punish offenders, and 
before which the members of society must submit all 
differences in respect of their rights of person and of 
property, to be determined according to the law of the 
land. Judges, therefore, should in the first place know 
the measure of right and wrong which the laws they 
are called upon to administer prescribe—that is to say 
they should be learned in the law; not merely with 
that learning which enables them to cite authorities 
and to quote, however aptly, the ideas of others to be 
found in the books, but there should be that habit of 
mind which enables men to look through and beyond 
the mere words—the husk in which the thought is 
clothed—to the thought itself, and so grasp the vital 
and animating principle of the law and apply it to 
the facts. As was said by an author replying to a 
criticism made by some one upon Judge Marshall, that 



60 


Addresses of James Keith 


he had not seen a case upon which the critic relied: 
‘‘There are judges who read more cases than they cite, 
and others who cite more than they understand/^ Not 
only ought a judge to know the law which he admin¬ 
isters, but he should understand the spirit of the insti¬ 
tutions of which the laws are but a part. He should 
be in touch with the people and know their history, 
their present needs and their aspirations for the 
future. Justice requires that her ministers should so 
live as to bring no reproach upon their high calling. 
Thrice happy and blessed he of whom it may be said, 
when after life’s fitful fever he appears before the 
final searcher of all hearts, as was written of one who 
filled and adorned the position which I now occupy; 
“He was learned without pedantry; grave without aus¬ 
terity ; cheerful without frivolity; gentle without weak¬ 
ness; meek but unbending; rigid in morals, yet indul¬ 
gent to all faults but his own. * * * 

‘He lived without reproach, 

And died without an enemy.’ ” 

Last, and above all, judges should be absolutely im¬ 
personal in the discharge of their duties. They should 
faithfully investigate whatever question is submitted 
to them whether of law or fact, and follow with “cold 
neutrality” the dictates of their judgments thus en¬ 
lightened. Much is sometimes said in praise of the 
merciful judge. I much doubt whether it is a quality 
greatly to be commended. You will remember in that 


J ustice 


61 


noble apostrophe and invocation to mercy which falls 
from the lips of Portia, she addresses it not to the 
judge who had no right to grant it, but to Shylock 
the unrelenting Jew; and when the distracted friend 
urges the court to— 

“Wrest once the law to your authority; 

To do a great right, do a little wrong; 

And curb this cruel devil of his will.” 

The answer is: 

“ ’Twill be recorded for a precedent; 

And many an error, by the same example. 

Will rush into the State: it cannot be.” 

If one comes to me who is in need, sickness, sorrow, 
or any other adversity and I relieve his necessity it 
is a kindly and meritorious act, and its merit is height¬ 
ened in the estimation if in order to succor him I am 
subjected to some sacrifice; there are charities and 
sweet amenities of life which elevate and adorn 
humanity flowing from those who have not even a 
widow’s mite to bestow, but which serve to “bless him 
that gives and him that takes.” 

“A man may have an honest heart, 

Though poortith hourly stare him; 

A man may take a neighbor’s part, 

Yet have no cash to spare him.” 

Wherever, therefore, it does not touch the sphere of 
judicial duty, mercy and charity are virtues in a judge 


62 


Addresses of James Keith 


as in others, and may, I trust, serve to hide faults 
which the ermine and silk robe might make all the 
more apparent. Judges and juries should not court 
the cheap applause which follows generosity at the 
expense of causes submitted to their decision, nor be 
merciful to the injury of society; otherwise it is a 
vain boast which proclaims ours to be a government 
of laws and not of men. Could all of us cultivate 
justice in our relations with each other, and could we, 
to whom society has given her utmost trust and con¬ 
fidence by making us the arbiters of every controversy, 
could we, governors, legislators, and judges, in the 
discharge of our high duties, render justice to all with¬ 
out respect to any, we should in some measure be 
worthy of the great men who have shed undying lustre 
upon the Virginian name. We might hope that in 
having lived we had left the world somewhat better 
than we found it, and that by precept and example we 
had sown seeds of truth and virtue which might make 
and keep our dear Old Mother Virginia worthy of her 
ancient renown. 

Who can say what times of trial are hidden in the 
womb of the future; who can say what dire necessity 
may confront our people; who can say how urgent may 
be the need for some Moses or Washington? When 
that time comes may God, in His infinite wisdom and 
goodness, again find in Virginia the instrument fitted 
to His hand for the regeneration of the nations! 



“TUCKAHOE” 


At a Gathering of the Descendants of William 
Randolph, of ''Turkey Island,'^ Under the 
Auspices of the S. P. V. A.* 

It has been a reproach to Virginia that, having made 
so much history, she has recorded so little; that rich 
as her past has been in epoch-making men and events, 
so small a part of it has been preserved. "The Goth, 
the Christian, time, war, flood, and fire,” have indeed 
left us but little of what it was in their power to de¬ 
stroy, so that he who would know what Virginia has 
done in the past worthy to be remembered must seek 
for it, not in the annals which she has written, not in 
the monuments she has erected, not even in the ruins 
scattered here and there upon her bosom which' may 
elsewhere link the present to the past: for here the 
work of destruction was so well done that there was 
nothing left but the blue sky above us, the green grass 
beneath us, and the stout hearts within us which, God 
be praised, have never quailed in the presence of any 
adversity! 

It is in the institutions under which we live with 
none to make us afraid that we find the story of what 
Virginians have done to deserve the applause and 
gratitude not only of their fellow-citizens, but of man- 


* Col. Archer Anderson introduced Judge Keith as the most 
prominent of the Randolph line, to respond to the host’s (Mr. 
Coolidge, of Boston, Massachusetts,) cordial words of welcome. 



64 


Addresses of James Keith 


kind; not only of to-day, but for all time. ’Tis said, 
^‘the aspiring youth that fired the Ephesian dome out¬ 
lives in fame the pious fool who raised it.'’ If the 
splendid fabric of our institutions were, like that 
great temple, sensible to sight and touch, to what an 
eternity of infamy would that wretch be consigned 
who should take from it the part which was due to the 
patriotism, the valor, and the genius of Virginians! 

“Paul may plant and Apollos may water, but God 
alone giveth the increase." It was not enough for the 
perpetuity of our institutions and the preservation 
of our liberties that all that was wisest and best of 
political principles within the ken of that generation 
should be embodied in our government. I will not go 
so far as to say, 

‘‘For forms of government let fools contest; 

Whate’er is best administered is best,” 

. •*.» ' * 7 ;! 

' . J 'yl 

but it is true that the mere framework of institutions 
and governments, that checks and balances upon the 
exercise of power upon the one hand and the enjoy¬ 
ment of liberty upon the other, without permitting the 
one to grow into tyranny or the other to degenerate 
into license, have ever proved vain and illusory. It is 
the spirit which vivifies and animates the institutions 
which, after all, differentiates the good from the bad. 
It was well for us, then, and for mankind, that patriot¬ 
ism, courage, a sincere love of our institutions, de¬ 
votion to liberty—^to liberty regulated by law and 
honesty in all things—especially in all things touch¬ 
ing the discharge of public duty, should have been the 



*'Tuckahoe** 


65 


influences which controlled the men to whose guidance 
affairs were at the outset committed. Virginians had 
played a great part in the work of construction. They 
were to play, if possible, a yet greater part in giving 
direction and bent to the government they had aided 
to create. 

Is any man rash enough to-day, looking back upon 
the storms of passion which surged around and 
strained to the uttermost institutions, as it were, still 
in the gristle at the close of the last century, to say 
what might have been had the present century not 
ushered in the administration of Thomas Jefferson? 
He had written the Declaration of Independence, and, 
as one of the committee upon the revision of the laws 
of Virginia, had shown himself entitled to rank among 
the greatest and wisest law-givers of ancient and 
modern times; he was in the evening of his days to 
give us the University of Virginia; he was so great a 
man, and had done for the world and his fellow-men 
such mighty deeds, that in that wonderful and most 
characteristic summary which he caused to be in¬ 
scribed upon his tomb, he could afford to omit to say 
that he had been twice President of the United States. 
Yet I doubt, if calmly considering all the debts that 
we owe to him, in estimating the value of all that he 
contributed, the spirit that he has breathed into our 
institutions, the example that he has left to us of 
wisdom, moderation, honesty, unquestionable love of 
liberty, and unshaken trust in the virtue of the great 
masses of the people, is not the most priceless of all. 

It is well, then, that the Society for the Preservation 
of Virginia Antiquities should take under its pious 


66 


Addresses of James Keith 


care this venerable relic of the past, around which 
cluster such memories. It was within its modest 
portals that Thomas Jefferson began to sow the seed 
that was to ripen into a glorious harvest. This spot, 
it may be said, was the intellectual birthplace of 
one whose life was destined to be a benediction to 
mankind. 

We are here to-day as guests of those who feel for 
his memory all the veneration due to his career as 
patriot and sage, all the tender reverence and affec¬ 
tion which nature has implanted for those from whom 
we descend and to whom we owe our being. They 
come back to us fromi the great Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts, in time past the mighty ally, and then 
the invincible foe, of Virginia; but now the two joined 
indissolubly together, watching, guiding, and guard¬ 
ing the fortunes of a common country as the great 
twin brethren did the destinies of Rome. They were 
citizens of Massachusetts yesterday, they are Virgin¬ 
ians to-day, for Virginia claims as hers all the chil¬ 
dren of Tuckahoe, by whatever name they may be 
called or wheresoever they may dwell. Therefore, in 
the name of our Common Mother, in the sacred name 
of Virginia, we welcome you home once more! 


THE SUPREME COURT OF APPEALS. 


Before the ‘Tewter Platter Club'' of Norfolk, 

Virginia. 

I have been told to speak of the Virginia judiciary, 
a subject which should never be treated lightly, and 
yet this is an occasion when a serious dissertation upon 
any theme will be, I fear, inappropriate. 

Were I to tell you what I know of the Virginia 
judges, I should, perhaps, merely repeat what you 
already know as well or better than I do; which would 
be a vain consumption of your time and an idle strain 
upon your patience. 

In truth, there is, as a rule, but little interest in the 
personal life of judges, however eminent. I recall Mr. 
Justice Gray's efforts to discover personal incidents 
in the career of Judge Marshall. He spent much time 
and research in the attempt, but the result was dis¬ 
appointing. 

I remember an incident which occurred while Justice 
Gray was in Richmond thus engaged, Which amused 
me at the time. He was speaking of the intimate 
relations that existed between the Chief Justice and 
Mr. Justice Story, and related what all of us have 
heard, that Story was placed upon the Court as a 
counterpoise to the Federal tendencies of the Chief 
Justice, and Justice Gray, drawing himself up to his 
full height of six feet four, said “Marshall laid his 


68 


Addresses of James Keith 


mighty hand upon Story and made him his own.” 
The action was dramatic and effective, and I suggested 
that he should introduce it into his address on John 
Marshall Day, and that it v/ould make a hit. '"No,” 
said he, ^That will never do. Story has too many kins- 
people in Boston.” 

That I may not trespass too long upon your patience, 
I shall confine what I have to say to two of the most 
eminent men who have adorned the juridical history 
of Virginia. 

When we speak of Virginia judges all men must at 
once recall Edmund Pendleton, the first president of 
our Court of Appeals. His, indeed, was a most inter¬ 
esting personality. Long distinguished as a member 
of the House of Burgesses, he took a leading part in 
the great events which culminated in our independence. 
He was president of the General Committee of Safety 
for the Commonwealth of Virginia; a member of the 
Continental Congress; president of the Convention 
which framed the State Constitution of 1776; and of 
the Virginia Convention of 1788 which ratified the 
Constitution of the United States; was appointed to, 
but declined to accept, the office of United States Dis¬ 
trict Judge; and was president of the Virginia Court 
of Appeals from its establishment in 1779 until his 
death, which occurred in 1803. He played many parts 
on the stage of life when it was crowded with epoch- 
making events, and his memory is still cherished and 
venerated after the lapse of more than a century, as 
a statesman and judge—wise, just and incorruptible. 

I claim Marshall as a Virginia judge. He was a 


The Supreme Court of Appeals 69 

Virginian to his very marrow. He served her faith¬ 
fully in war and in peace, and his work as a judge has 
laid the foundations of the government of the greatest 
people earth has ever known upon a principle more 
enduring than brass—^the influence and results of 
which seem to know no limits of space or time. 

I have said that he laid the foundations of govern¬ 
ment upon a principle, and I spoke advisedly. His 
opinions elucidate many principles of government, but 
all of them are subordinate to and dependent upon one 
which is paramount. He sought to establish a gov¬ 
ernment resting upon respect for and obedience to 
law. That was the nationalism of John Marshall, a 
nationalism which knows neither youth nor age, was 
never new and can never grow old. Great as he was, 
great as have been and are many of those who have 
succeeded him upon the awful tribunal over which he 
presided, he knew and felt—and pray God that none 
who follow him may ever forget—that the law is 
greater and wiser than any man—I mean that law of 
which Blackstone speaks as ‘‘the garnered wisdom of 
a thousand years,^’ that law “which o'er thrones and 
globes elate .sits empress, crowning good, repressing 
ill;” that law whose “seat is the bosom of God, her 
voice the harmony of the world,” to whom “all things 
in heaven and earth do homage, the very least as feel¬ 
ing her care, and the greatest as not exempted from 
her power.” 

For my part I feel no jealousy of the greatness of 
the United States. Virginia has too great a share in 
that heritage of glory. They will expand and grow 


70 


Addresses of James Keith 


greater still in a natural and healthy course of evolu¬ 
tion and development, if our people are but true to the 
foundation principle upon which all their institutions 
rest—respect for and obedience to law. I recognize 
fully that in the redistribution of power between the 
State and the National government which is unceas¬ 
ingly in progress, the people will surely look to that 
which will best subserve their needs, and sooner or 
later the popular will, under our form of government, 
will slowly but surely crystalize into positive law; 
and it behooves those who wish to preserve the balance 
of power between the nation and the States to gird 
themselves for the struggle—not by vain lamentations 
with respect to the operation of forces which may 
move at a glacier’s pace but move also with a glacier’s 
resistless momentum—but by seeing to it that the 
State shall do more wisely and more efficiently what 
the people may resolve shall be done than can or will 
be done by other agencies. 

In this contest the Bar can, if it will, play a decisive 
part. In all time of trial the Bar of the past has done 
its whole duty. Resolve to be its worthy successors. 
A great field for you! All that makes for the wel¬ 
fare and health of the people, their education, their 
morals, and the peace and good order of society, are 
eminently within the domain of the reserved powers 
of the State; enough surely to satisfy the most eager 
and ambitious for opportunity to serve the public. 
Let us then arm ourselves for the strife as lawyers 
and judges. Let us resolve to quit ourselves like men, 
and perhaps it may come to pass that some of us may 


The Supreme Court of Appeals 71 

do that which will be gratefully remembered and, fail¬ 
ing that, we shall at least have the high consolation, 
the most comforting of all assurances, that we have 
faithfully discharged our duty. 

Broadly stated the United States will foster and pro¬ 
tect the material interests of the people because they 
can discharge that duty, in the main, more effectively 
than can the States, for their jurisdiction overleaps 
State lines; but to the States is committed the nobler 
task of cherishing the moral growth and welfare of 
their citizens. Let our laws reflect the highest moral 
sense of our civilization; let them be faithfully and 
fearlessly enforced; let juries and courts impose the 
penalties prescribed against evil doers, and evil doers 
suffer the punishment imposed; let our material pros¬ 
perity and our civilization rest upon a basis of respect 
for law wisely conceived and justly executed, and our 
country will flourish in immortal youth. 

If we shall devote ourselves wholly to material suc¬ 
cess we shall meet the fate of by-gone nations who 
with short-sighted presumption have lifted up the 
golden calf as the object of their adoration. ‘Tos- 
terity can hardly trace the situation of some; the sor¬ 
rowful traveler wonders over the awful ruins of 
others, and as he beholds he learns wisdom and feels 
the transience of every earthly possession.’^ 

It may be that fate has forced upon the State the 
less splendid but nobler part. i 


THE JUDICIARY. 


':tU 

Before the Bar Association. ‘ ' 

It has on two occasions been my fortune, good or 
ill, to be called upon to respond to this toast; a cir¬ 
cumstance which manifests a commendable disposi¬ 
tion on the part of this Association to afford me the 
opportunity of supplying any deficiencies in my treat¬ 
ment of the subject. It is a difficult, not to say an 
embarrassing, theme for me to discuss, as the greater 
part of my life has been passed in the judicial office. 
Were I to portray this evening the character of a 
judge in fitting colors it might invite an invidious com¬ 
parison to my own disadvantage, while it would be 
yet more to my discredit if after so many years I had 
not even learned what a judge should be. But what 
can I say that has not been already better said? If 
we seek to know all the virtues that should adorn 
judges ''with reference to the parties tliat sue, unto 
the advocates that plead, unto the clerks and ministers 
of justice underneath them, and to the sovereign or 
State above them,’’ of whom can we hope to learn if 
not of him who "took all knowledge for his province.” 

Bacon’s Essay upon "Judicature” contains a most 
admirable and comprehensive summary of what a 
judge should be. "Judges ought to be more learned 
than witty, more reverend than plausible and more 
advised than confident. Above all things integrity is 
their portion and proper virtue. 'Cursed is he that 






The Judiciary 


73 


removeth the landmark/ The mislayer of a mere stone 
is to blame; but it is the unjust judge that is tthe 
capital remover of landmarks when he defineth amiss 
of lands and property. One foul sentence doth more 
hurt than many foul examples; for these do but cor¬ 
rupt the stream, the other corrupteth the fountain.” 
Alas for poor humanity that he who knew so well what 
a judge ought to be, should in his example illus¬ 
trate all that a judge should not be! 

There is I fancy no difference of opinion here as to 
the qualities that a judge should possess, the virtues 
he should practice or the faults that he should avoid. 
He should be learned, firm, patient, prompt in the 
transaction of business, tolerant of differences of 
opinion; yet how easily these virtues which all admire 
deteriorate into faults which all condemn or deplore. 
Learning often begets pedantry; firmness degenerates 
into obstinacy; patience invites delay; haste and care¬ 
lessness tread upon the heels of expedition; and honest 
conviction, which is absolutely essential to the judicial 
office, is not always upon good terms with that com¬ 
plaisance of disposition which renders us tolerant of 
the opinions of others. 

After all is said, gentlemen of the Bar, there can 
never be a perfect judge under existing conditions. 
I do not refer to the weaknesses and defects incident 
to frail humanity. The difficulty lies far deeper. It 
is a law of physics that two bodies cannot occupy the 
same place at the same time; nor can the same body 
occupy two positions at the same time; nor can a judge 
be on both sides of the same question, and there lies 


74 


Addresses of James Keith 


the root of much evil. Resort to what device you 
may it fails just at this point. If you attempt to bridge 
the difficulty by a compromise decision, instead of be¬ 
ing applauded for your amiable efforts at even-handed 
justice you are derided and execrated alike by counsel 
for plaintiff and defendant, each equally confident that 
the result achieved was at the expense of his client; 
while if resort be had to the simpler expedient of de¬ 
ciding by turns for one and the other, it wins no grati¬ 
tude. The victory was always deserved, was but the 
just reward of a righteous cause championed by skill 
and learning, while defeat is attributed to the inca¬ 
pacity of the court, to that judicial blindness which 
cannot or will not see and embrace the right and the 
truth, however ably and attractively presented. 

While, therefore, I cannot hold out to myself or to 
you the hope of seeing a perfect judge, I trust I may 
be able to make suggestions which may diminish, if 
they do not remove, some of the defects under which 
the judiciary labor. 

I would remind you that all judges are, or perhaps 
it would be more accurate to say, were, lawyers before 
their induction into office, some of them, indeed, men 
who stood in the very forefront of that noble pro¬ 
fession. 

Our Constitution and laws provide that the judges 
of this Commonwealth shall be learned in the law. 
They are taken, for all classes of our judiciary (ex¬ 
cluding for the present, justices of the peace), with 
rare, if any, exceptions from your ranks. How are 
they selected ? 



The Judiciary 


75 


They are elected by the Legislature, but in the elec¬ 
tion how is the Legislature guided in its choice? 

Upon this subject I shall venture a few observations 
as to the duty of the Bar of the State at large, and of 
this Association in particular. 

In the first place, discard from your minds at once 
and forever the idea that any judicial position is 
trivial in its nature or that it should be filled by any 
other than the best man obtainable under existing 
conditions. 

Take the Justice of the Peace for example. He fills 
relatively the lowest in rank of all judicial offices in 
our system, yet when we come to consider that in civil 
causes his jurisdiction extends to almost all contro¬ 
versies not involving more than one hundred dollars, 
and that in criminal cases he hears and decides in the 
first instance all misdemeanors, we can but be im¬ 
pressed with the vast interests committed to his care. 
The money value of the rights of property actually 
dependent upon judicial determination by Justices of 
the Peace is far greater, in the aggregate, than that 
determined by the Court of Appeals. It is true that 
they are not required “to be learned in the law,” need 
not be lawyers even in name, and are chosen by the 
people, but these circumstances render it all the more 
important that care and circumspection should be used 
in their selection. 

Do you, gentlemen of the Bar, do you do your duty 
in selecting the class to whom are committed the great 
interests to which I have just alluded? 


76 


Addresses of Janies Keith 


Take next the county courts. They are courts of 
appeal from the judgments of justices and courts of 
exclusive original jurisdiction in all felonies, and have, 
in addition, reposed in them a great mass of duties 
relative to the administration of county affairs, which 
make the office one of the first importance to the order, 
repose and well-being of society. Unhappily they are 
but poorly remunerated, though many of the judges 
of the county court would adorn any judicial station. 
They are elected by the Legislature but the naming of 
them is, I am informed, considered one of the inalien¬ 
able rights of the county member. A judgeship of 
the county, with its great and responsible duties in the 
due performance of which every citizen of the Com¬ 
monwealth is profoundly interested, has come to be 
regarded as a part of the spoils which the individual 
member of the Legislature is to dispense as his per¬ 
sonal patronage, and so, in perhaps less degree, with 
other judicial positions. 

Now, I wish to ask this Association, I wish to ask 
the Bar of this State, in all soberness and earnestness, 
do you think that you do your duty to your profession 
and to this Commonwealth in the matter of selecting 
Judges, including Justices of the Peace? 

If you think so, I will say frankly I am constrained 
to differ with you. You have taken one important 
step in the right direction. You have, at least, en¬ 
deavored to safeguard the profession and the public 
against unworthy and incapable lawyers and, in the 
effort, have imposed upon the Court of Appeals severe 
and thankless duties which we will discharge cheer- 



77 


The Judiciary 

fully in the honest belief that it will redound to the 
advantage of the Commonwealth. The care bestowed 
upon applicants for admission to the Bar can bear 
nothing but good fruit, and not the least of its benefits 
will be found, I doubt not, in the improvement of the 
judiciary. Scrutinize the men who seek admission to 
the Bar and scrutinize them yet more closely when 
they seek to pass from the Bar to the Bench. Let it be 
understood in your communities that you have no per¬ 
sonal ends to serve, no private ambitions to promote in 
the selection of justices and judges, but that you have 
an eye single to the fitness of the aspirant for the posi¬ 
tion which he seeks; let “Will he be faithful, will he be 
efficient be your only inquiry, and I doubt not you 
would be amazed at the great and beneficent influence 
you would exert. What greater service could you 
render to your profession and to your State? 

One of the issues which hard necessity is pressing 
upon our people is the need of economy in the conduct 
of affairs, so that the cost of government may be re¬ 
duced as far as is consistent with efficiency of admin¬ 
istration. 

Every day that a court is kept open, every continu¬ 
ance of a case, means an additional burden upon the 
tax-payer; and the unnecessary loss of time in the 
trial of causes, continuances granted upon frivolous 
pretexts, thus prolonging the sessions of courts and 
withdrawing suitors, witnesses, and jurors from their 
private affairs, are responsible for no trifling additions 
to the great cost with which the administration of jus¬ 
tice is attended. This charge may be diminished by 


I 


f 


78 


Addresses of James Keith 


the direct action and influence of the Bar. A little 
care and preparation for speedy trial would produce 
very perceptible results, but the duty of seeing that it 
is done rests with the courts. 

There cannot be a prompt, efficient, and faithful 
administration of justice in the courts without capable 
judges. We do not, in the courts or elsewhere, gather 
grapes from thorns or figs fromi thistles. You must 
select men for judges who know the value of time and 
how to use time to the best advantage; and when you 
have found them, aid them as far as you can in the 
performance of their duties. 

I have but one more word to say to you and I trust 
that it will not too greatly shock your just apprecia¬ 
tion of your profession. Judges should be and, I sus¬ 
pect, are, little as you may be disposed to admit it, 
fairly representative of the Bar over which they pre¬ 
side. A judge absorbs, in a measure, the heat and 
light which are emitted in his opinions. I do not 
refer to the direct debt which judges are supposed 
to owe to the brief for gems of thought and eloquence, 
transferred without acknowledgment from its pages 
to their opinions, but to that elevation of thought and 
sentiment on the part of a great advocate which be¬ 
comes the inspiration to a great judge. Who that has 
read the opinions of Marshall can doubt but that his 
mind was kindled and inflamed by the lightning which 
flashed from the genius of a Pinkney or a Webster. 

Lord Brougham, in a passage familiar to each of 
you, said: 







The Judiciary 


79 


“He was guilty of no error; he was chargeable with 
no exaggeration; he was betrayed by his fancy into 
no metaphor; who once said that all we see about as 
Kings, Lords and Commons, the whole machinery of 
the State, all the apparatus of the system and its varied 
workings, end in simply bringing twelve good men into 
a box.’" 

If the selection of a jury be of such mighty conse¬ 
quence, far higher is the duty involved in the selec¬ 
tion of judges. The jury decides the case and is dis¬ 
missed. If the verdict is wrong it may be likened to 
him that removeth a landmark, to “the mislayer of a 
mere stone,” as Bacon phrases it, while the incapable 
judge remains a source of many unjust judgments, 
and thus “corrupteth the very fountain of justice.” 

I have thus endeavored to point out to you, gentle¬ 
men of the Bar, some of the methods by which you 
may, by your individual and united efforts, do much 
to elevate the judiciary. You know what that judi¬ 
ciary ought to be; do your share in making it what it 
should be. So may we avert from this Commonwealth 
the “greatest curse with which an angry God can 
afflict an erring or a sinning people—a weak, a cor¬ 
rupt, or a dependent judiciary.” 


JUDGES. 


At a Banquet of the State Bar Association at 

THE Hygeia Hotel. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen: 

When I was first informed that I had been selected 
to reply to the sentiment just given, I naturally looked 
around for some avenue of escape; I recalled what 
had been told us yesterday of the self-sacrificing 
lawyers of the olden times, who were ever ready to 
compose immortal orations, to be delivered by their 
clients, and I, in the simplicity of my heart, applied 
to certain of my friends to come to my rescue; but 
alas for you and for me, I offered no fee, and I found 
my honored friends were therefore without feeling. 
They were orators of the silver tongue variety, that 
is to say, orators whose tongues only respond to silvery 
influences. 

I then bethought me of the many speeches, good, 
bad and indifferent, to which I had listened in the past 
twenty years, and how often and how devoutly I had 
prayed that people who have nothing to say would 
say it briefly and to the point, and sit down; and I 
thought I could not do better than to give the precept 
and enforce it by my example, and thus point a moral 
and adorn a tale; but, just as I was striving and pain¬ 
fully struggling towards this conclusion (for I will 
tell you in confidence that a judge trying to find out 
anything for himself is in a helpless and awkward 


Judges 


81 


predicament and very like a beginner who first essays 
to swim without the aid of the accustomed bladder) 

I was, I say, just reaching this sensible conclusion 
when some evil genius put in an appearance and re¬ 
minded me that once upon a time, ere I had become a 
judge, I had been somewhat of a lawyer—and a won¬ 
derful thing happened. Did any of you ever experi¬ 
ence the sensation? I was seized with an irresistible 
desire to talk and to hear myself talk; so here I am 
with a great theme before me. 

Do not suppose, I pray you, that because I have 
spoken lightly I fail duly to appreciate the great, the 
awful responsibility of judicial station. If I have 
spoken with levity, it is because I have felt my utter 
inadequacy to the task of doing justice to the subject. 

The duties of a Judge! My friends it is a theme 
worthy of the eloquence of those sages of Greece and 
Rome whose names and memories, undimmed by time, 
shine along the centuries like the fixed stars. Who 
that listened yesterday with pleased attention to our 
eloquent friend did not feel his heart glow with gen¬ 
erous emotion as the story was unfolded of the noble 
part his profession had played in the trials and 
triumphs of our race from the dawn of history to the 
present day, and how its members were indissolubly 
associated with every great social, religious, and politi¬ 
cal movement? How they have been ever ready not 
only to sound the tocsin of liberty, but ever ready also 
to perish in her defence. 


82 


Addresses of James Keith 


It has been granted to the Bar of Virginia to con¬ 
tribute its full quota of the chosen few whose memory 
the world does not willingly let die. It requires but 
little stretch of fancy to believe that “the departed 
spirits of the mighty dead’’ had been permitted once 
again to return to earth “to fight in some sacred cause 
and lead the van,” and the greatest orator of Greece 
might well have been our own forest-born Demos¬ 
thenes. 

It is the fashion with some to look upon lawyers 
as a class separate and apart from the rest of the 
community, but in all the broad limits of our dear 
old mother Virginia she has no more devoted sons. 
All our sympathies, all our interests, are hers; noth¬ 
ing can wound her without giving us a correspond¬ 
ing pang. In all time of her rejoicing, in all time of 
her tribulation, we have been and shall remain her 
true and devoted children. How many men do I see 
before me, how many do I recall who are not here, who 
gave the best years of their lives and poured out their 
blood like water in ready obedience to her high behest. 
Among them I may refer, I trust without invidious 
discrimination, to my loved and honored friend, from 
my own circuit, who as lawyer, soldier and states¬ 
man, has served his country with so much honor to 
himself.* Small wonder is it that such a profession, 
with such memories and traditions, should demand 
that the judiciary of the State be without fear and 
without reproach. The terms in which the sentiment 
to which I am called upon to respond is clothed, seem 


* [General Eppa Hunton.] 




Judges 


83 


at once to convey a recognition of the virtues of the 
illustrious dead who have adorned the bench of Vir¬ 
ginia and an admonition to the living as to what is re¬ 
quired of them. 

When we recall the names of Virginians who have 
filled judicial positions, the mighty shades of Marshall 
and Pendleton, of Washington and Roane, of Tucker 
and Carr, of Moncure and Daniel, of Joynes and Boul- 
din, and of a host of others, pass in review before us; 
and we know and feel indeed that we must be pure, 
faithful and fearless, to be v/orthy successors of such 
men. With their example to inspire us, and aided by 
the zeal, ability and learning of the gentlemen of the 
Bar, let us hope that the judiciary of Virginia will 
ever remain '‘Guardians of the right, the refuge of the 
weak, and a terror to evil doers only.*' 


CHIEF JUSTICE WHITE. 

At a Banquet in His Honor, Richmond, Virginia. 

\Fehrvmy 22y 1913,] 

When honored with an invitation to speak to this 
distinguished audience upon this most interesting occa¬ 
sion, I was told that I was expected to say very little, 
and was chosen because I could be relied upon to do it, 
and to do it within the briefest possible limits. I shall 
try to live up to the bargain. 

For me to attempt to be humorous would be to in¬ 
vite you to witness the gamboling of an elephant, while 
the limitations to which I have referred forbid the 
attempt to treat a serious subject exhaustively. 

Belonging to that unfortunate class which is the 
mark for so much criticism, invective and denunciation, 
I have frequently asked myself what is the moving 
cause for the general dissatisfaction manifested to¬ 
wards the judiciary of the country? What wrong lies 
at the root of it, and what is the remedy? I shall 
assume that dissatisfaction so generally felt is not 
without some actual justification in fact—^that, to use 
a homely but expressive figure, ‘"Where there is so 
much smoke there must be some fire.’’ Doubtless it is 
much exaggerated, but making due allowance for that, 
a residuum of truth and right remain to be seriously 






Chief JtLstice White 


85 


considered with a view to ascertaining the cause and 
applying a remedy. 

That there are many men holding judicial positions 
for which they are by nature and training utterly 
unfit, that some are idle and inattentive to their duties, 
that some are addicted to bad habits, and that now and 
then a judge is found capable of rendering a decision 
from corrupt motives, I believe—^though the latter 
class, I am confident, is an extremely small one. 
Wherever a man is found upon the bench essentially 
wanting in qualities that fit him for judicial office, he 
should be removed, and if guilty of corrupt conduct he 
should be impeached. The law of this State is ample 
to meet every possible exigency of the situation, and 
it is the duty of the Bar to see that it is scrupulously 
enforced. From their ranks the judges are chosen, 
and for the sake of their own good name as well as 
for the public good, they should be alert to see that 
men called from their ranks to judicial office shall 
reflect no discredit upon the body from which they 
are taken. The duty would be onerous, unpleasant and 
invidious in a high degree, but there are few duties 
in life the performance of which does not involve 
labor and sacrifice. 

But the Bar at an earlier stage may do much by 
way of prevention of evil, which is far better than 
any remedy for its cure. Let the Bar rise to the height 
of its duty when a judicial position is to be filled. Let 
them find an inspiration and example in the conduct 
of the President of the United States in appointments 
to the Supreme Bench, that highest and greatest of all 


86 


Addresses of James Keith 


earthly tribunals. Let them turn a deaf ear to per¬ 
sonal solicitation and to individual ambition. Let them 
determine to admit no motive of action other than a 
desire to promote the public good by aiding to the full 
extent of their power and influence in the choice of the 
men best fitted by character, natural abilities, tastes 
and attainments for judicial office, and they will find 
the great body of public opinion ready to meet them 
half way with their confidence and approbation. 

When the great Tobacco Case was under argument 
at Washington I chanced to be present, and when the 
Justices at two o’clock took a recess, I found myself 
near Mr. Johnson, the great leader of the American 
Bar. (I hope that what I am about to say is not in 
very bad taste, but I shall say it anyhow.) He and I 
fell into conversation, and I remarked that it was a 
fine thing in Mr. Taft to appoint a Democrat, a 
Southern man and a Confederate soldier to be Chief 
Justice. Mr. Johnson seemed not to think it so won¬ 
derful, all things considered, for he replied as follows: 
“Why, what was he to do? Justice White is the 
greatest living English-speaking judge, and there was 
nothing else for the President to do.” That was great 
praise from a great source. 

I still think it was a great act on the part of the 
President, than \yhom no more patriotic and upright 
man ever filled the office of President of the United 
States. John Adams said that if he had done noth¬ 
ing else than appoint John Marshall Chief Justice, he 
would have deserved the gratitude of his country. I 
hope, I trust, and I doubt not, that in coming time. 




Chief Justice White 


87 


when our honored guest shall have closed a long and 
great career, and shall have drawn the drapery of his 
couch about him and lain down to pleasant dreams, 
men will remember that in giving him to us Mr. Taft 
rose above party spirit and sectional prejudice to the 
topmost height of patriotic duty. 










































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































